Block referencing with a equations

Basement
1

Hello!

First of all, Obsidian is great, thank you for your work! I’ve been lurking around the forum for a while and finally decided to register.

I want to ask whether it is possible to use block referencing when we have equations in combinations with text? If so, how?

The trick is, that equations have to have a new line around them for formatting purposes and blocks seem to be looking for a line break, so I am having trouble defining an equation and its accompanying text as a block.

Here is an example. I would like the block to start right after “Companion form”

**Companion form**

$z_{t}=F_{1}(\Phi) z_{t-1} + F_{c} (\Phi)+\nu_{t}$

where the first n rows of $F_1(\Phi)$, $F_c(\Phi)$, and $v_t$ are defined to reproduce the DGP ^ce73ba
- $\nu_{t} \sim \operatorname{iid} N(0, \Omega(\Sigma))$ 
- another equation

^test

[[#^test]]

If I delete the line after the first equation, I get the sentence “where the first…” to be inline with the $z_t$ equation, which I do not want. Currently ^test points to the first item in the list, so the second equation.

Is such a thing even possible?

I’ve found two workarounds so far:

  1. Use a list, i.e. start each line below the next equation with “-”, then it is not a problem.
  2. Use atomic notes, embed them where you need them and reference them.

If this is currently not possible, a workaround could be to be able to tell where the block starts, not only where it ends, i.e. “wrap” blocks and not look only for the ^blockid syntax.

2

Ohhh, me stupid…

Simply use $$ $$ to force a math linebreak, which, however is not counted for a line break for the blockid.

This is one paragraph:

     **Companion form**
     $$z_{t}=F_{1}(\Phi) z_{t-1} + F_{c} (\Phi)+\nu_{t}$$

This is not:

**Companion form**

$z_{t}=F_{1}(\Phi) z_{t-1} + F_{c} (\Phi)+\nu_{t}$
3

Okay, me not so stupid after all. My question still stands.

The $$ $$ solution works but then you lose the list afterwards. So the question remains, how to wrap the whole example above as a block?

4

I am confused, the behaviour is really wonky.

Can somebody tell me why is this a block:

whyisthisablock
whyisthisablock1187×324 21.9 KB

but this is not?

whyisthisnotablock
whyisthisnotablock1462×530 53.1 KB

I am referring to having the text preceding the equation as part of the block in one instance and not as part in another.

I am willing to share the .md files.

5

No need to share the files—mind pasting the two examples in code-fenced block here, though?

6

Of course!

However… stupid question, how do I do code-fenced block? I see options for “pre-formatted text” (Ctrl-shift-C) and “Blockquote” (Ctrl+Shift+9).

Here is with pre-formatted text:

**Companion form**
$$z_{t}=F_{1}(\Phi) z_{t-1} + F_{c} (\Phi)+\nu_{t}$$

^tsaffsa

[[#^tsaffsa]]

and

**The DGP is a monthly VAR:**
$$x_{t}= \Phi x_{t-1}+\ldots+\Phi_{p} x_{t-p}+\Phi_{c}+u_{t}, \hspace{20pt} u_{t}=N(0, \Sigma)
$$

^testsaf


[[#^testsaf|what?]]
1 Like
7

Finally getting back to this, sorry for the delay.

It looks like the issue is that you have a line break after the suffix $$ in the second example.

This works:

Screen Shot 2020-11-23 at 1.21.07 PM
Screen Shot 2020-11-23 at 1.21.07 PM1427×875 73.2 KB

You may want to see the discussion here on blocks and $$ use:

8

Thank you and no worries about any “delay”.

It looks like the issue is that you have a line break after the suffix $$ in the second example.

Do you mean a line break before the suffix $$? I think that explains it. I have one between line 7 and 8 on the second example and deleting that solves the problem:

comp2
comp21352×929 67.1 KB

I still think this behaviour is wonky. Why does a line break between line 7 and 8, in the equation (which in latex typically has no effect, so people would not expect it) acts as if there is a line break between lines 6 and 7?

I don’t understand your example. In your picture, if I see correctly, the equation name “The DGP is a monthly VAR” is rendered. In my case it is not. As far as I see in your example, the difference is that in the second case there is no break after $$ and ^testsaf. This does not reproduce the behaviour on my end.

And thanks for the link to the thread regarding my original question. I read through and as far as I understood:

  • there is a suggested workaround with headings. Headings are a totally different thing for me and I would not put a heading for every equation. Also I do not want equations in the table of contents. The atomic notes (my current workaround) is better but not optimal
  • this would not be considered (at least not currently). I really think, that introducing opening and closing synthax is an elegant solution, as suggested in those topics.

Did I understand the discussion correctly?

I see that the discussion has been marked as resolved. I still have no idea how to create a complex block with multiple equations which is not an atomic note.

9

Yes, the issue is the line break, and yes, if you want to do more complicated block references, you’ll need to use headings.

In reproducing the example I showed, be very careful to use the exact same number of lines & line breaks. I can paste the raw text later if you’d like.

The issue is the markdown parser. I don’t understand it very deeply, but it is non-trivial to get the markdown parser to recognize certain sets of lines as a single block. That’s why one-line equations work, but multi-line will not.

You can certainly create a feature request to encourage the devs to address this issue. Feel free to copy-paste whatever’s helpful from this thread.

Also, for what it’s worth, a workaround is to use e.g. H6 headings and use css to hide them in preview, such that these are not “real” headings, just display math markers.

10

Ah, I understand, thank you!

For my use-case using atomic notes is actually better. This also makes the obsidian notes easily portable in the future, as far as I understand block-referencing is something added because of user pressure and it is non-standard in terms of mark-down synthax.

I will consider making a feature request, thank!

1 Like